Nineteen

How to spell nineteen

8 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce nineteen

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does nineteen mean?

1. otherThe cardinal number equal to one more than eighteen, written 19.

Nineteen in a sentence

• She turned nineteen on her last birthday and started her first job.

• The bus stops at exactly nineteen minutes past the hour.

Where does nineteen come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

Nineteen comes from the Old English nigontȳne, a straightforward joining of nigon, meaning 'nine', and tȳne, an old form meaning 'ten more'. The -teen ending that English still uses for the numbers thirteen through nineteen is simply a worn-down version of that 'ten' element, so nineteen literally announces itself as 'nine and ten'. The word belongs to the deep Germanic core of English vocabulary, with close cousins in Dutch negentien and German neunzehn, all built on the same nine-plus-ten pattern. Because it is so old and so common, the spelling has stayed simple; the one detail worth remembering is that the 'nine' part keeps its final e even though it sits in the middle of the word, giving nine-teen rather than the sometimes-mistyped 'ninteen'.

How the word is built

• nine (the number 9)
• -teen (suffix meaning 'plus ten', from Old English tȳne)